The only good thing I can think of regarding Western civilization's struggle with Islam is that the Saudis and Iranians will run out of oil relatively soon (in the next 50 or 60 years) and the United States should still be a great power, although I am sure a greatly diminished one. After they run out of oil, Saudi Arabia and Iran will start to revert (pun intended) to look like the Muslim countries around them that don't have oil: Yemen and Afghanistan. And that will be deliciously ironic. Too bad I won't be alive to see it. Really, this brief instant in time is the Saudis' and Iranian's only chance to try and make Islam dominant in the world again. After the oil and the money run out, their pathetic economies will be revealed and they will no longer be able to afford to export Islam all over the world. However, unless we are vigilant, 50 or 60 years of Jihad may be enough to conquer large parts of the earth. Then, we will still have to deal with the large Muslim populations that have transplanted themselves in our countries.

I console myself by thinking how dark and without future the world must have seemed to much of Europe prior to 1683 when the Turks were finally turned back at Vienna. Many people at that time must have believed it would only be a matter of time until all Europe was Islamic.

Posted by: Mentat at January 18, 2007 11:32 AM

We have the written instructions, in Arabic, given the 9-11 hijackers. What they are to think about before their last moments. There is no mention of American foreign policy, American culture, or even the words United States. There is no mention of any event in the last 25 years.

But they are instructed to read and understand sura 8 & 9 of the Qur'an on the night before.

They are to think of themselves as if they were fighting alongside their ancestors, the companions of the Prophet, in the 7th Century. To tie their clothes in the same way, recite similar verses "as the predecessors used to" to "hit over the necks and hit every finger of them" and to look at their victims as part of a metaphysical struggle, the "civilisation of disbelievers" who are directly linked to the devil... or as animals to slaughter: "let everyone of you sharpen his knife and kill his animal."

Posted by: Nick Danger at January 18, 2007 11:59 AM

Islam, that division between Believer and Infidel, and between Dar al-Islam and Dar al-Harb, about which Dinesh D'Souza appears to know so very little.

"The very term "Islam" means "submission" to the authority of Allah. This worldview requires that religious, economic, political and civil society be based on the Koran, the teachings of the prophet Mohammad, and on the sharia, or Islamic law. Islam doesn't just regulate belief and practice; it covers such topics as the administration of the state, the conduct of war, the making of treaties, the laws governing divorce and inheritance, as well as property rights and contracts. In short, Islam provides the whole framework for Muslim life and, in this sense it is impossible to "practice" Islam within a secular framework."

Dinesh D'Souza "What's So Great About America"

Posted by: PMK at January 18, 2007 12:13 PM

A very real argument can be made of the Left’s being an accessory before the fact to 9/11.
The Left thrives on anti-Americanism and, in so doing, gives others the license to attack America.
The Left has a deep antipathy toward religion and has attempted to remove all religion from public life in America, to the point of destroying crosses in cemeteries and wiping out landmarks with even a hint of Christianity. (Our national anthem and other patriotic songs have not yet been declared a violation of the separation of church and state, but it's only a matter of time.) The Left doesn't apply this standard to Islam because it is a minority religion and minorities must be protected from "the tyranny of the majority”.
The Left since Vietnam has worked assiduously to weaken American allies who didn’t meet their standard of virtue. Exhibit A is the Shah of Iran. When Soviet Communism was spreading throughout Asia and Africa, Jimmy Carter decided the Shah didn’t deserve to be an American ally. He gave us Ayatollah Khomeini and legitimized the open state sponsorship of terrorism against America. Iranians have never renounced this policy.
The Left wants virtue to take priority over reason. They make the perfect the enemy of the good. They want Americans to be martyrs to their virtue. There are times when good people must do bad things in order to preserve their societies. This slack is not given to America. The world can attack us at will, but we cannot retaliate without being demonized for harming "innocent” civilians. We are all lucky that FDR didn't have to fight WWII in this environment.
This doesn’t mean all on the Left are evil or traitorous. They're misguided and will cause the death of us all. Look at what is happening today. We can’t track terrorist finances. We can’t keep terrorists out of the country without proof of their perfidy. We can’t even enter the mosque because we will be “violating their civil rights”.

His words might not sound pretty, but Dinesh D'Souza isn't that far off the mark. We certainly have enemies in Islam who want to see us destroyed, but they could never do that without the active assistance of some Americans, many of whom are now in positions of power or leading the educational institutions that are distorting American history.

They are teaching Americans that our culture is not something to be preserved. Christianity and Judaism have been demonized as evil or slave-traders and the only remaining source of virtue is Islam. The enemy within is more than a figment of a paranoid imagination. We ignore it at our peril.

Posted by: PMK at January 18, 2007 12:31 PM

This isn't a left-right thing. It's the classic mistake people like D'Souza make. He takes whatever bothers him about Western Society and projects it on the terrorists, saying "this is what they hate about us." A leftist might complain about capitalism, our support of Israel, or our big military while someone like D'Souza complains of excessive sexual freedom or lack of family values (whatever that means) but both sides fail to realize that it's not about us, it's about them. They hate us because they want to hate us.

Simple as that.

Posted by: JadeDragoness at January 18, 2007 12:55 PM

JadeDragoness

They hate us because we haven't folded and recited the shehada. It's that simple.

Posted by: Infidel Pride at January 18, 2007 1:03 PM

Twenty years ago, or thirty, one was told -- and one believed -- that the Nation of Islam was a Good Thing. It was good because it gave its followers discipline. They wore dark suits, white shirts. They even wore ties. They were not gang members. They did not deal drugs. In short, what else could one ask for?

There is Mussolini, waving his arms, pugnacious and prognathic, Il Granitico orating from the balcony of the Palazzo Venezia, overlooking the Piazza Venezia, and never mind the killing of Matteotti or many other brave Socialist and Republican mayors (to the Dinesh D'Souzas of the day, the expendable "left"). Mussolin would bring Hope. He would bring Order (here are the cute little black-shirted boys of the balilla, just like the black-balaclaved bezonians, all Qur'an and Kalashnikovs, goose-stepping through the boulevards of Beirut and Gaza, and points east, west, north, and south if we were to fall for the Dinesh D'Souza view of things). But Mussolini stood for The Family. He promoted Family Values. He stood for the Farmer -- he promoted the old rustic values. He stood for the Worker, and drained the swamps, and made those trains run on time: il Rapido, il Rapidissimo.

And don't forget Adolf Hitler, offering Hope to those sickened by the chaos and disorder of Weimar Germany, "decadent" Weimar Germany, with Brecht and Lotte Lenya (yes, a former streetwalker) and those nightclubs, and those Grosz and Kirschner drawings making fun of our hardworking capitalist princes and our straight-thinking bourgeoisie). Join Hitlerjugend und march, march, march together, always together. Make your salutes Together. Think the same thoughts -- Together. Be orderly, be mannerly, be Clean In thought, word, and deed, as Hitler and the Party require.

Nothing to worry Dinesh D'Souza about any of that. Nothing of the messy "cultural left" in any of that.

His view is dangerous, and so is he -- if not yet in esse, quite, still he is now seen to be so in posse. And the Conservative Book Club, in selecting his book, and all those who treat him with respect, are similarly deserving of much more than a raised eyebrow.

Posted by: Hugh at January 18, 2007 1:05 PM

While I would agree with PMK that there are many people on the Left who are treasonous or at least clueless on the issue of Islam. HOWEVER, the list of those on the right who have enabled Islam is indeed long and should never be forgotten.

Is James Baker a liberal?

Is Grover Norquist a leftist?

Are the "conservative Americans" on the American Committee for Peace in Chechnya who are supporting Chechen jihad of the left? Haig? Brzezinski? Dick Allen?

http://www.peaceinthecaucasus.org/about_members.htm

Who are more powerful and able to affect change, the people above or the witless Juan Coles and ANSWER Coalitions of the world?

Was it "liberal PC" that created the "Visa Express" system for the Saudi hijackers, or was it plain old "oil corruption"? Do liberals all of a sudden run the oil industry?

Posted by: Abu Lahab at January 18, 2007 1:51 PM

Dinesh D'Souza needs to remember the American Revolution. We Americans were not conforming to the British Tax Laws if I recall. That is immoral right...not paying your taxes. Dam Thomas Jefferson and George Washington for the their lack of conformity. Oh please lets not forget Benjamin Franklin and his nightime meetings with semi-prostitutes. Dam him for his lack of good morality.

Why this man worries me is conservatives who are so important will buy this nonsense becuase they think they can kill two birds with one stone. They will go after the liberals with their "morality problem" and stop Islamic terror by proving that conservative Americans are just like muslims. We should be helping each other produce a moral world.

Jeeze! This is as bad as the silly liberal argument that they hate us becuase of capitalism, Israel or American policies. Just stupid!

Posted by: greatcometof1577 at January 18, 2007 2:10 PM

It was interesting to watch D'Souza on Colbert report.

Posted by: pagan at January 18, 2007 2:51 PM

PMK,

"The Left doesn't apply this standard to Islam because it is a minority religion and minorities must be protected from "the tyranny of the majority”.

This over-simplifies the problem on two accounts:

1) The Left's failure to apply the standards of secularist progress to Islam is not merely because it is a minority religion. It goes far deeper than that, revealing a complex sociopolitical sea change that has occurred in the West over the past 50-odd years.

2) Which leads to the second over-simplification in your statement. The sociopolitical sea change I refer to above, which I name PC Multiculturalism, has become so dominant and mainstream that it has come to affect, and infect, both Left and Right -- not on every issue, but certainly on the pressing issue of the Problem of Islam, with only marginal and largely irrelevant variations in flavor. (There are exceptions to this rule where we see some people on the Right manifest the higher degree of rationality their political culture has preserved, but this is so rare, and the rare instances of it usually so piece-meal and insufficiently mastering the Learning Curve about the Problem of Islam, that these exceptions turn out to "prove the rule", not overturn it.)

What PC Multiculturalism provides, what it has constructed over the past 50-odd years, in the context of a mainstream pedagogy of unremarkable sociopolitical massiveness and pervasiveness, is an "other Islam" -- a holographic reduplication of the actual Islam of history and the news: a holographic reduplication sanitized of all blame and causation for the mountain of dangerous problems coming out of the Muslim world.

The Other Islam—A Holographic Reduplication :

http://hesperado.blogspot.com/2006/12/other-islama-holographic-reduplication.html

Posted by: remote_control at January 18, 2007 2:56 PM

D'Souza says that radical Muslims don't like us because cultural Left make them so. So we have to make alliance with "moderate" Muslims and fight and win victory over cultural Left.

But if Left is no more, radical Muslims will not hate us, right?

And since they no longer hate us, why we need alliance with "moderates"?

So, delete Left and Islam will let us alone.

I nominate D'Souza for Nobel Peace Prize 2007!!!

Posted by: mik_infidel at January 18, 2007 3:52 PM

I said it the first time I heard about this books a month or so ago, and I will say it again -- D'Souza is a complete moron. There is a section of the right, the so-called socially conservative right, that really shares a lot of the ideas of the Islamists. They both want religion to dominate public life and government, they both want social values that are vaguely medieval, they both want to turn the clock back on many changes in society. They are less vicious than Islamists but their affinity in many aspects is plain. It is precisely the freedom to be and live whichever way you like, to enjoy liberty and the pursuit of happiness our own way, that is our distinguishing feature and our strength as Western societies. The far left is equally loony in rejecting every single tradition, and in self-hatred, and in decadence. I say extremists and theocrats, both Christian and Islamic , good ridance to them -- and because of their affinity it's not going to be the religious right that will lead the fight against the radical Muslims.

Posted by: migcca at January 18, 2007 4:10 PM

Whilst D'Souza may have grossly mischaracterized the hatred that Islamists exhibit (after all the hate is, indeed, inherent within the basic tenets of Islam); he does IMHO make an important point. The left, by its continued concentration on faulting America for all the ills of the World, does indeed give fodder to the Islamist propaganda machine. To the left (at least the vocal majority of those who are on the left) America is a far bigger problem than Islam.

Posted by: Razdan at January 18, 2007 7:56 PM

D'Souza's thesis seems depressingly similar to the garbage spouted by Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell mere days after 9/11, blaming America for being attacked because it had become so "sinful" (read, tolerant of homosexuality, abortion, divorce, single parenting, sex education...). I think it's important to separate this fallacious argument from what is (IMO) the much more valid one that the various ideologies of the political left both in N.A. and Europe have, unintentionally or not, allowed radical Islam to grow and flourish.

Posted by: angloirishslav at January 18, 2007 11:31 PM

"visceral rage"

Yep, that always seems to be the excuse. Do these apologists think that muslims are animals, not capable of rational thought? Do muslims view themselves that way?

No: most humans have learned to let the rational mind take over and subdue the reptilian one. Most belief systems kick in and tell us that calming down is a good idea when we feel 'visceral rage'.

It's islam that has the opposite effect, the rational mind taking them further in the direction of violence: 'I'm really angry, and if I go ahead with violence, I'll also go to heaven!'

Posted by: Lili at January 18, 2007 11:42 PM

JadeDragon and Anglor

You've got it right! Complaints about 'sexual freedom' often really mean complaints about gay rights, and women's freedom to be independent, dress as we wish, choose our own partners, use contraception etc.

Political-correctness and over-tolerance of intolerance is the west's only mistake. Not enjoying our hard-won freedoms as we wish, as long as nobody else is harmed.

When people start whining about women 'dressing immodestly', 'excessive sexual freedom', lack of 'family values', lack of religion, it's often hard to tell islamists apart from other religious extremists.

I'm fighting for secularism and our freedoms (whether we choose to use them or not), not for a bunch of values I can hardly tell apart from islamic ones.

I say all this with the understanding that islamists want to enforce all this stuff in a nastier, more violent way than other religious extremists. Which is why islamists are my biggest concern right now.

Posted by: Lili at January 18, 2007 11:55 PM

PMK Makes a good point but overstates it: The left have indeed contributed to the jihad coming at us, in too many ways to enumerate here (I'm **trying** to exercise some restraint: my postings are WAY too long). They are enumerated, partially anyway, over on DhimmiWatch.

JadeDragoness' first point is a sound critique of the problem of PMK's point: This is not a left/right issue. I agree in spades.

First, the left's behavior on these issues can probably be grossly oversimplified by saying that they have 50 or 60 years of momentum in which they have learned that the great social engineering program that defines their core values is opposed most strongly and consistently by voices and powers on the right.

As a consequence, and perhaps for defensive or strategic reason, a "new" value has crept into their core: opposition, at all costs, of anything beholden to the political right, the Judeo-Christian "establishment" (as if such a thing still exists), and the "Christian right". Perhaps it has always been there, but in any case this schismatic and oppositional approach to politics and religion (which they have great problems separating!) has loomed more important than some of the so-called key values of liberalism. A choice between feeding the poor and publicly dissing vocal evangelicals, or humiliating right wing politicians? No brainer for many "liberals": diss the evangelicals and humiliate the politicians. Poor? Feed them after we get rid of the rednecks.

Guess what? The right doesn't look much better in this regard. D'Souza is probably as good an example as any. Hijack any issue and use it to deepen the left/right divide, to demonize your "political enemy". Except for the specific rhetoric, names and issues, the two sides look pretty much alike to me; it's a football game and the lines are drawn.

D'Souza's thesis has some truth, which should be acknowledged but stated more correctly.

First, the left has been reinforcing the rhetoric of injustice and feeding the victim mentality. In the name of justice they have developed an alarming tendency to magnify small offences to demonize those they deem worthy of antagonizing and spinning non-offenses as if they were offensive. This is seen most clearly, probably, in their handling of the Palestine/Israel affair. By making loud noises about what they regard (or paint) as one-sided justice issues they assure the Jihadists that a good chunk of the West is on their side, so they know they can get away with plenty more of what they already have done.

These folks also present the Jihadists with what is surely regarded as fundamental weakness in the west: public criticism and ridicule of our leaders and so on. Now, I concede that the Left/Right antagonism is in itself a sign of great weakness, but the ability to criticize (and ridicule) our leaders is actually a sign of strength: only strong societies can afford this luxury. Also, society is healthier when there is a free exchange of ideas. The weakness comes from the enmity that our divisions cause -- before we can win this war we must learn to disagree over political issues without polarizing all aspects of our discourse.

Second, the left has put marvellous tools in the hands of the "Polite Jihad" folks: the whole machinery of the human rights movement, the legacy of civil disobedience, the rhetoric and legal tools of civil libertarianism, and so on. What a great toolkit! It seems that, beyond a bit of terrorist funding (I think they are small fry on that side of things) CAIR has majored exclusively on the art of assimmilating (Borg-like) all of this machinery and turning it to support the Islamist cause.

The whole business of continually demonizing the "western establishment" and vindication of the other, always placing the blame on the true victim, gives them another tool absolutely for free: an Ummah ripe for harvesting: millions of people angry as hell at the west and willing to do almost anything (well, ok, anything) to get back at the evil western powers.

But the major lie in Souza's work, as described (I haven't read it, nor do I intend to) is the notion that somehow jihad and the whole islamist agenda was invented or sparked by the actions of Westerners. This is just ignorant B.S. (excuse my Arabic). That kind of reasoning will get the west deeper into trouble.

The left has aided and abetted, handed them weapons and created a fertile climate for their actions -- but they did not invent or initiate the Jihad; none of their other "oppressed group" clientelle have responded in the way the Islamists have. Let us give credit where credit is due.

How has the right contributed? Well, by being complicit in deepening the Left/Right divide with extreme redneck rhetoric, unnecessary sabre-rattling and "you're with us or agin' us" cowboy mentality. The right, by and large, is more awake to the Islamist threat than the left (let us not overgeneralize -- there are many exceptions to this rule on both sides). By continually polarizing the issue the right keeps the left asleep to the threat. If solidarity was ever needed it is on this issue.

Posted by: Archimedes2 at January 19, 2007 12:29 AM

"I realize that this is a strong charge, one that no one has made before."

One can't underestimate the extent to which D'Souza's witless thesis became a book for this simple reason: it's not the best argument, but it's loud and it's mine.

It's a provocative charge. One that will get attention. One that he can claim as his own (somewhat disingenuously, but no one will bother to hunt for antecedents). These are the prerequisites for publication. Whether the idea is accurate or cogent or provides an intelligent synthesis of fact is utterly irrelevant to the real dynamic at work:

Look at me, Dinesh D'Souza, aging conservative wonderboy: I had a new idea!!!

Posted by: mountainecho at January 19, 2007 1:59 PM